She nodded, and that seemed to be the last of her strength. She dropped her head, her hands coming to her face, tears escaping between her fingers. Venick pulled her into his chest, holding her upright even as his own knees slackened and his breath escaped him and the world went wobbly at the edges. Dourin. Dourin was dead.
Venick rocked Ellina as she cried. He told her he understood how much it hurt. He told her that he wished he could take her pain away. He said he knew it wasn’t the same, but that Dourin would always love her, and he would, too.
???
Afterwards, Ellina was exhausted and looked ready to drop straight to sleep. Venick settled her into a folding chair within the tent. He poked his head outside to ask for Erol, but the healer was already there.
“Please,” Venick said.
Erol was efficient, but gentle. He asked Ellina a few questions, checked her pulse, peered into each eye. He coaxed her to drink a brew of tea mixed with an herb calledgrivinita,which he said would help with the muscle spasms that had begun wracking her thighs and back. Venick hovered over Erol’s shoulder, oscillating between a feeling of furious protectiveness and one of deep loss. Erol gave Venick a look, and when Venick chose to ignore this, the healer cleared his throat. “Venick. You are blocking my light. Perhaps it would be best if you waited outside?”
Venick wasn’t blocking the light. It was midday, and they stood inside a closed tent—there wasn’t a singular light source to block. But Erol’s expression was turning severe, and Venick had to choose, very deliberately, not to be difficult. He slunk outside.
The day had shifted, the sun shining weakly through tumbling clouds. Somewhere in the brush, a dove chirped a single, throaty note. Men and elves lingered nearby, but like eavesdroppers caught in the act, they quickly turned away, pretending great interest in a number of menial things: the gloves in their hands, the dirt under their fingernails.
Branton and Artis were gone. Lin Lill was nowhere in sight, either. Venick felt glad for that without really understanding why he was glad.
He resumed his pacing. His boots worked to tamp down patchy grass. Then he realized Erol could probably hear him, and that he was being distracting again, so he forced himself to sit. He stared into his open palms. They were filthy, a raw strip in the centers from where he’d been clutching Eywen’s reins—a reminder to relax, to stop holding on so tightly, learn to loosen his grip on things.
Think you can, Venick?
No.
The sun moved in the sky. Though Venick had given no exact orders, the soldiers knew enough to realize they would not be traveling again that day. Tents were re-erected. Fires sprang back to life. The mood lifted further at the prospect of a day of rest.
When Erol finally emerged, he took one glance at Venick and crossed his arms, ready to reprimand.
Venick said, “I feel like I’m losing my mind.”
Erol softened. He dropped his arms, gave a sigh. “She’ll be fine, Venick.”
“She swam all the way here.”
“I know that.”
“She could have been hurt.”
“She wasn’t.”
“She had no food. No shelter.”
“She’s stronger than you think.”
Venick grabbed the back of his neck, stared down between his knees. He knew he was supposed to believe that, because Ellina had been strong before, and because she was a legionnaire, and an elf. Not helpless. Not someone who needed saving. But it was so hard to reconcile these facts with the image of Ellina as she had been in his tent: brittle and empty-eyed and breaking down in his arms.
Erol picked his way delicately across the earth, came to sit in the yellow grass at Venick’s side. “She’s sleeping now. The sleep will be good for her. Much of what you’re seeing is merely exhaustion, easily remedied with a bit of rest.”
“I’m not sure exhaustion is the whole of it.” How much more could Ellina take, really? It had started with her sister Miria, whom Venick had known as Lorana, someone they’d both loved. But then Ellina had lost her mother, and her country, and her voice, and now her best friend, who was perhaps the last person on this planet whom she truly trusted.
“I’m worried about her,” Venick said. “I’m worried about everything she’s been through and the way it’s making her act.” Venick had an image of a different water-soaked Ellina, followed by Lin Lill’s dry,The princess fancied a dip in the river.He remembered looking up in Igor to see an empty saddle, later finding Ellina caught in the center of a growing mob with hands on her weapons. He saw her diving through a window in the ballroom. Pushing her horse full speed across a dark landscape. Ripping off her armor mid-fight when Venick had asked her, he’daskedher not to put her life at risk unless absolutely necessary, and really not even then.
“She shouldn’t have followed us,” Venick said. “That was so foolish. And for what? She’s making decisions for the wrong reasons.”
“Not for the reasons you think she should, you mean.”
“Not for any reasons that make sense. I’ve never known Ellina to be so reckless.”
Erol gave Venick a candid, almost melancholy smile. “She’s not who she used to be.”
